


Surrender

by GoodIdeaAtTheTime



Category: Gundam Wing
Genre: Halsey - Freeform, M/M, Mild Angst, Never Have I Ever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-23
Updated: 2017-07-26
Packaged: 2018-12-05 19:48:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11584983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoodIdeaAtTheTime/pseuds/GoodIdeaAtTheTime
Summary: For the Halsey Challenge on Tumblr. Four drabbles in the relationship of Duo and Wufei.





	1. Heaven In Hiding

_ And when you start to look at me, a physical fatality _

_ And you surrender to the heat, you'll know _

_ I can put on a show, I can put on a show _

_ Don't you see what you're finding? _

_ This is Heaven in hiding _

 

It had started with a round of ‘Never Have I Ever’, whoever’s smart idea that had been. But it was Relena’s party, and she wanted to try to force some normality into her life - even if they were in their late twenties, and no-one played ‘Never Have I Ever’ if they were able to afford decent alcohol, because what a waste.

But this wasn't his party, so he was on best behaviour.

It had actually been going pretty well, and been pretty fun. Until Dorothy.

Dorothy had looked at him - and dammit, he’d been polite all evening, despite wondering why she was even here in the first place - and smiled across the table.

Once, Duo had found a book on Greek myths - the story of Eris, and the golden apple. Spite, a gift thrown into the gathering, followed by chaos.

He imagined Eris looked then the way Dorothy looked now.

“Never have I ever had sex with Duo Maxwell,” she said, as if she was savouring not only the fact, but the flavour of the words.

He didn’t know what she hoped to accomplish with it. Knowing her, nothing more than trying to make him squirm.

Well, good luck with that.

He met her gaze impassively, as around the circle, everyone drank, save Dorothy, and himself.

And Wufei.

Most of them knew about each other, there were a few saucy winks across the table, and a handful of surprises. He sat back in his chair, relaxed, and smirking lazily at the blonde woman across the table. She laced her fingers together and leaned forward to rest her chin on them, cataloguing reactions from their friends for what purpose he couldn’t begin to imagine.

Some of them were comparing notes, laughing; Relena was blushing even as she giggled with Hilde and Quatre; Heero rolled his eyes and ordered another drink; Sally and Trowa had been there together at times, so they just wanted to get on with more of the game.

Wufei’s face was strangely blank, but his eyes darted around the people surrounding him, as if trying to compile a list in his head and compare it to what he already knew. There was a slight wrinkle between his eyebrows, a tightness in his jaw, and Duo realised.

It wasn’t just Duo she’d been aiming for.

 

*

 

The cab back to Wufei’s place had been nearly silent, and Duo began to wonder if he’d be better just grabbing his duffel and heading to the station, seeing if he could get an earlier train home. It was so late, they’d start running in a handful of hours anyway.

But then he thought, fuck it, and followed his host into the kitchen as he started to make himself a mug of tea - his ritual before bed, no matter the actual time.

“You’re pissed,” Duo told him, leaning back against the counter, watching Wufei pretend he wasn’t acutely aware of his presence.

“I’m no such thing.”

“You’re also a shitty liar.”

“You’re all adults,” Wufei said stiffly, snatching up the kettle as it boiled, pouring it into his mug. “You’re all welcome to your bizarre incestuous affairs.”

“You’re jealous,” Duo purred, and didn’t miss the flinch that the other man couldn’t quite suppress. “You’re feelin’ left out.”

“I’m not,” he snapped. “I’m simply… mystified as to what could cause so many otherwise rational people to indulge in the same fit of madness.”

“Madness?”

Duo’s voice was a low rumble, and when Wufei turned around he was startled to find himself boxed in against the counter, not quite touching but close enough to feel the warmth.

His heart was pounding in his ears, he was certain Wufei would be able to hear it, but he didn’t care.

Maybe it was the alcohol, but there seemed to be a flush on the other man’s cheeks, his breath seemed to catch a little. Dipping his head, their noses brushed against each other, and he definitely wasn’t imagining the way Wufei tilted his face oh-so-slightly to accommodate him.

“A little madness can be pretty… exciting,” he murmured. “Sanity’s overrated anyway.”

“I’ve never found madness an appealing concept,” Wufei breathed, but he didn’t sound convinced. His hands had found their way to Duo’s arms - possibly to push him away, but instead they were gripping, pulling closer.

Legs slid between legs, hips shifting to fit together like they had always meant to.

This was Duo’s favourite part. He felt the thrill down his spine and in his gut as Wufei’s back arched minutely, opening himself up for Duo to press closer.

“I can be very persuasive.”

A few, thumping heartbeats. A shuddering breath. A challenge.

“Show me.”

  
*


	2. Coming Down

_ I've got a lover and I'm unforgiven _

_ I'm such a fool to pay this price _

_ It's coming down, down, I'm coming down _

_ It's coming down, down, I'm coming down _

 

_ I found a martyr _

_ He told me that I'd never _

_ With his educated eyes _

_ And his head between my thighs _

 

_ I found a savior _

_ I don't think he remembers _

_ 'Cause he's off to pay his crimes _

_ And he's got no time for mine _

  
  


Things had not gone how he had planned. In fact, the situation had got so far away from him that it was almost unrecognisable as anything he could have planned in the first place.

Sleeping with Wufei had been half a way to say ‘fuck you’ to Dorothy, to subvert whatever bad feeling she had hoped to inspire between the pair of them with her reveal of Duo’s sexual history. And the other half…

Well, it was kind of an ego boost to have the full set under his belt, if he was being honest with himself.

But.

It had gone wrong, somehow.

The others had understood, been very clear - Duo didn’t do relationships. Duo relied on himself, because he was the only one who could survive it.

Even Relena, romantic that she was, had understood it. Even Quatre, who lived and breathed emotional connections, had agreed. Even Hilde, who had probably had a crush on Duo until they had slept together, had realised what she was signing up for.

And perhaps it wasn’t that Wufei didn’t get it. It wasn’t even that Duo hadn’t been clear about it.

It was just.

Something about the way every time it happened it came as a challenge from Wufei - come on, then, if you think you’re hard enough (pun intended). And goddammit, but Duo loved a challenge. He would never back down from a dare.

And then it had become something else.

Duo had never slept with anyone else who had lost everything.

Heero and Trowa had never had anything to begin with.

But Wufei, like him, had seen everything he had burned up; like him, it was all his fault.

There was a strange kind of understanding in Wufei’s eyes, even as he wasn’t asking about the burn scars, long faded to white. A reflection of experience, free of judgement, and all too knowing.

He felt vulnerable.

Exposed.

He didn’t like it.

But he couldn’t stop coming back to it.

Being so open, even without saying anything, sent this strange thrill through him - adrenaline, a high that prickled down his spine and made everything seem more intense.

It was when Wufei came over to his, and they didn’t do anything. They just sat. Listened to some music and read, and then slept. That was when Duo knew.

He’d gone too far. It was too late.

Back to reality with a crash, ice cold and alarming.

He needed to get out.

Before someone else burned.

 

  
*


	3. Haunting

_ 'Cause I've done some things that I can't speak _

_ And I've tried to wash you away but you just won't leave _

_ So won't you take a breath and dive in deep _

_ 'Cause I came here so you'd come for me _

 

_ I'm begging you to keep on haunting _

_ I'm begging you to keep on haunting me _

_ I'm begging you to keep on haunting _

_ I know you're gonna keep on haunting me _

  
  


Wufei had been used to Duo disappearing. He did it regularly, a couple of weeks, a couple of months. That was Duo. Trying to pin him down was like trying to nail down a shadow.

He had also been used to Duo coming back.

Even with the irregular rhythm of whatever their relationship had become, there was something familiar about it. Somehow, he’d always been able to tell how long Duo would be gone for. Something in his eyes, in his movements, before he left - telling Wufei that it was a big escape, or a short break. Telling Wufei what he needed.

That was the only way he could have known, because for all Duo talked, he never really said anything.

That first night had been a catharsis for Wufei. A working out of long held frustrations and sudden,  inexplicable hurt at the revelations that evening.

Duo had been right. A bit of madness had been exciting.

Intoxicating.

Addictive.

All too familiar to him, in the end, it seemed. He could see fires in Duo’s eyes and memories, written large on his skin; fires which brushed against the ones inside him, the one he saw across the blackness of space when he shut his eyes, an afterimage that never faded.

So Wufei kept goading him, challenging him to come back and touch him, those feelings, again. Make the burning feel so good.

But he became good at reading the forecast on the other man’s face, scrying the future in his gestures. Instinctively he knew when he was getting ready to leave, and had a sense of how long he’d be gone.

And every time, just as the itch under his skin was building to the point that it was almost too much, no matter how long the gap, like he was anticipating it, Duo returned. Soothed it, cooled it, made the red hot searing in his soul good again.

Except this time.

The itch was persistent, crawling under his skin, tormenting, teasing.

Duo should have been back.

Duo wasn’t coming back.

He was everywhere in Wufei’s space, his head, ghosts of sensations teasing and taunting.

And he was nowhere to be found.

Since the bar, Wufei had seen Dorothy a handful of times. The first few, after they had started - whatever it was they had started.

And once, a year after Duo had left.

She had looked him slowly, up and down, and then a slow, pleased smile had spread across her face, like a gamble had finally come good for her.

“What?” he demanded, irritable. Sensitive. Hurt and alone.

“Nothing,” she said lightly. “I just always wanted to see how you crumbled.”

And she left him, with a flick of her hair and a sashay.

And he burned.

 

*


	4. Now or Never

_Yeah, draw the line up_

_Don't take no more time up, yeah_

_Make your mind up_

_I need you to make your mind up, yeah_

_Draw the line up_

_Don't take no more time up, yeah_

_Baby, you gotta decide something_

_Let me know_

 

_Baby, gon' love me now, now, now, now, now, now_

_Now or never, hey, hey, hey_

_I want you to hold me down, down, down, down, down, down_

_Down forever, hey, hey, hey_

_Said you know I wanna keep you around_

_'Round forever, hey, hey, hey_

_I want you to love me now, now, now, now, now, now_

_Now or never_

  


Two years.

Two years, three weeks, and two days, more precisely.

But when he opened his door and saw Wufei on the stoop, it was like he had been gone no more than half an hour. Everything was fresh and stinging again, and he couldn’t breathe.

“Hello,” Wufei said.

“...Hi.”

A long pause, too many things to say, too few words to verbalise them. Wufei tilted his head to the side, slightly, quirked an eyebrow expectantly.

“...Can I come in?”

Duo stepped aside, couldn’t help inhaling as Wufei passed him, the scent transporting him thousands of miles, thousands of hours away, to a different place and time.

His apartment wasn’t much to look at, but it was his, for now.

Everything was for now. Nothing lasted, nothing remained.

Except, apparently, the strange effect Wufei had on him. The strange desire to expose himself, emotionally, physically, and fling himself on Wufei’s mercy.

That wasn’t how you survived. That was why he left.

Wufei took his time, studying the apartment - bedsit, one bath (if you were feeling generous), open plan living, old, really old - before turning to level Duo with a look that spoke volumes.

“Yeah, alright,” Duo muttered. “It does what I need.”

“What do you need?” Wufei asked. “I’m curious,  because apparently I couldn’t provide it, so I’d like some feedback.”

“It wasn’t about you.”

“Evidently.”

“Not like that.”

“Like what, then?”

Slouching to the kitchen, he stuck his head in the fridge and reached in for a beer, holding a bottle out blindly behind him to Wufei, and, after a moment, it was taken. Fingers brushed against fingers, slippy with condensation. Sparks, tingles, shocks.

“I don’t do relationships,” Duo said, finally, standing and twisting the cap off his bottle, knocking the fridge door closed behind him.

“Bullshit,” said Wufei.

A pause, then bottle cap tossed onto the countertop, and a long drag of the cool, bitter drink.

“You don’t use that word.”

“Bad influences in my life, clearly.”

“Not any more.”

“And why is that?”

“...For fuck’s sake-”

“If that’s what it takes.”

He sighed, leaned on the counter, fingers fiddling with the cap there. He watched that, instead of looking at Wufei. Instead of facing up to things he didn’t want to face up to.

“I thought I was pretty clear. I don’t do relationships.”

“You certainly said that a lot,” Wufei agreed, finally opening his own bottle, the hiss sharp in the tense atmosphere. “But you sounded less convinced each time.”

Who had he been trying to remind, Duo wondered. Wufei, or himself? Trying to repeat his mantra so he remembered what was at stake, why he kept his distance, why it was important not to get connected.

Why he needed to be alone.

The next thing he knew, Wufei was pulling him across the counter, hand fisted in his shirt, and their lips were meeting in a kiss, that was hard, and messy, and god help him it felt like coming home.

Beers were left forgotten on the side, as they stumbled across the room to the bed. Frantic hands pulled at clothes, stripping, tearing, discarding, and by the time they fell onto the mattress and into each other, it was like no time had passed.

And Duo was painfully aware of the ache he had been ignoring, by its sudden, blissful absence.

 

*

 

Two years, six weeks, and four days after he left, Duo stumbled across Wufei's threshold, everything he owned stuffed into his two duffel bags.

 

*

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last chapter! Thank you everyone who has read, kudosed and commented! Please be sure to check out the other fics done for this challenge by claraxbarton, Amberlyinviolet and Kangofu-cb!
> 
> http://archiveofourown.org/collections/Hopeless_Kingdom

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to rara-pa for beta-reading! :)


End file.
